Rhodes a Beautiful Greek Island

My favorite photo of Rhodes Old Town.

We had an unexpected early arrival into the island of Rhodes and this is due to Aegean Air offering us a direct flight from Crete to Rhodes. Our original flights included a stopover in Athens. Obviously we took the flight and this meant that we didn't have to sit around for 2 hours extra in the airport. We ended up leaving at 7:30 a.m. and arrived before 8:00 a.m. into Rhodes. We had the whole day to do whatever we wanted to do. We picked up our rental car and talked to the rental car agency about the situation in Crete. Our car would not start that morning and we needed to get it filled with gas and back to the airport like we normally do. There was a bit of stress but it all got worked out in the end. We contacted our host for our Airbnb and he said we could arrive early. We made our way through Rhodes and arrived into our nice two bedroom two bathroom apartment. His name was Fotis and he showed us around, how to use everything. Greeks get their hot water from the hot water tank on top of their house which heats up with the sun. There's plenty of sun in Greece which makes sense but some days it's cloudy and if you don't have warm water then you have to press a button on the electrical panel on the wall.

We needed to pick up some groceries and there was a little grocery store kitty corner to us that had quite a few products, but a little bit pricier. She was a really nice, helpful, slightly English-speaking woman and had lots of fresh produce. We bought a few groceries and walked to the local bakery just down the street. Everything looked delicious and he picked up some sliced white bread and Baklava. Two big pieces of baklava weighed about a pound. It was ridiculous. It was full of nuts. It was quite good.

We then went up the street towards our house and there was a Chicken Store, that's all they sold was raw chicken in various cuts. They had some coated chicken schnitzels with no garlic in them so we picked up three of those. They also sold eggs and Darren picked up some extra chicken because he's a carnivore. We took all of that home.

Lisa and I made our way to Old Town Rhodes and easily found the gorgeous Grand Master's Palace. Rhodes is currently a living medieval city and it was only a 20 minute walk from our rental. There was so much to look at so much to see that it was slightly overwhelming.

We took copious amounts of photos of Old Town Rhodes. The Castle Walls were so pretty.

Originally this would be where water was in the Moat.

The Church Bell Tower is easy to see past the stone walls of the Castle.

First glimpse of the Castle Building.

Moat has been replaced by green grass and walking paths.

You can see the Arab
influences in the
Castle Walls.

We decided to break Rhodes into chunks. We went and looked at the Palace and this is where the Grand Master of the Knights lived, we walked in to see the price and they said it was 20 Euro but it was free on Sundays. No-brainer, we would come back tomorrow. We asked about the gardens which had copious amounts of statues, they said they're closed for renovation.

Old gate that is rusting away.

We were pretty pumped to be there.
The beauty was overwhelming and I loved the cobble stone walkways, the walls, the doors etc.

There are numerous gates into the Old walled city of Rhodes.

Stunning.

Bougainvillea grows on a vine and grows well in the Mediterranean.

Slate tiles mixed with Cobble stones.

Look at the top of this barrel vaulted ceiling.

Ancient beam at the top of the door frame.

Outer Castle Wall.

Some of the marble emblems are deteriorated but you can still see the Greek Cross.

Cats are a big part of Rhodes Island.

Religious statue welcomes
you into this gate.

We continued to walk down the Street of the Knights and it was beautiful. Most of the buildings were completely intact or restored and it was very reminiscent of the Royal Mile in Edinburgh, Scotland but older than Edinburgh. We continued to weave our way to the old church and they said that we needed a ticket to enter. We walked over to the Archaeological Museum of Rhodes which is supposed to be very good. It was 10 Euro but free tomorrow, so 'win win chicken dinner'. We would save both of those for the next day which was coincidentally a Sunday.

Castle turret.

This marble emblem is in great shape.

The pretty Castle.

Old door has its own sort of beauty.

Castle arches had quite decorative stone work.

Street of the Knights.

Panoramic shot of the Castle

This Castle built in 300s is in very good shape.

The door into the Castle is in great shape. It was about 8 inches thick.

Street of the Knights.

Cats cats everywhere.

Morning Glory vines bloom profusely throughout the Old Town. It is one of my favorites.

We walked around the beautiful old streets and Lisa found some bracelets for her sisters that she thought she might want to buy and we continued on and we sat down and had a glass of wine in this intersection of medieval streets in an outdoor Cafe. I had a nice glass of wine and Lisa had a beer. We saw for the very first time Halloumi Greek Cheese on the menu. We had to have it and it was delicious.

Undeniable beauty in many streets in the Old Town.

Lovely street with a narrow road.

I love the streets with bridged buildings.

Pretty streets have an alluring pull to draw you in and you feel compelled to continue to walk around and discover them.

Another gate into the Old Town.

Elaborate old building bridged over the two inner walls.

Arches are everywhere in the construction of most Medieval towns. It helped with strengthening the inner walls and preventing them from collapsing outwards.

I loved this outer vestibule area. The mosaic tile and everything about it was eye-catching.

Street of the Knights.

Very pretty building on Street of the Knights which was the old entry door into the French Consulate.

Inside the French Consulate garden area. This was open to the public for an Art Exhibit.

Another beautiful door with a perfect marble slab of emblems as a door lintel.

A street straight out of Medieval Times except for the Motorcycle in the distance.

Who doesn't need a few old cannonballs for decoration on your street. This barrel ceiling of this arched walk through was especially lovely but strong enough to not fall down almost 2000 years later.

Impressive marble door emblem in good shape.

Lovely turn in the road.

There are cats everywhere in medieval Rhodes. You stop to read a sign or look at a ancient pillar and there's one sleeping on top of it. They're kind of everywhere and everyone feeds these Cats. They are proliferating but it would make more sense to spay and neuter them. But it seems that the Greek culture loves cats and this is again reminiscent of Cyprus where there were hundreds of cats and everyone feeds them. Lisa was getting a little annoyed with me because I had to stop and take a picture of them and go and look at the cats.

Kitty out cold on the top of an old arch soaking in the heat of the stone warmed up from the sun.

Stray Mommy Cat, very watchful of me getting close to her 4 kittens. They lived in among garbage, which was very sad.

Kitty asleep outside the Palace walls.

We walked home because it was an exhausting day getting up at 3:00 a.m. in the morning to get ready to catch that early flight to Rhodes. We packed it in early that night after watching a movie. We watched, A Room Full of Dynamite, no popcorn but the TV did have Netflix on it.

Day two we got up and made our way to the Grand Master Palace first and the Palace was gorgeous. Most of it had been restored by the Italians, therefore there were all Italian museum pieces from the Renaissance and we had not learned a thing about the Grand Master.

Super impressive sea gate into the Old Town.

Map of Rhodes (Old Town)

Outside the Castle.

Inside the Castle

Courtyard statues inside the Grand Master Palace

Panoramic shot inside the courtyard of the Grand Master Palace.

Grand staircase up to the second floor of the Castle.

Beautiful wall emblem.

Looking down from the Grand staircase.

Original Mosaic Floor in the Castle

Checkered effect of different stone colors
in the Grand Master Palace.

Renaissance statues in the Castle.

This Mosaic Floor of Medusa was interesting.

A Ming style vase in the Castle, which we were not expecting.

Grand hall was impressive.

Stunning room in the Palace.

An eye catching hallway.

Old Renaissance style furniture and eye-catching floor.

Elegant Wall murals in a parlor room. The Grand Master of the Knights would have had a posh life living in this decadence.

I loved the beamed ceiling style of this curved hallway.

The Fireplaces were grand.

Looking out a Palace window to the courtyard statues.

Morbid but a stunning engraved coffin.

Sitting area for gazing out the window. The shutters were a unique design unlike anything I have ever seen in a Castle before.

This was the choir room with a gorgeous mosaic floor and the choir chairs were super ornate and in excellent shape. Obviously these had been well-oiled over the centuries.

The Palace dates back to 300 AD when the Knights built it. The main exhibit of the chronological history of Rhodes was closed, which was disappointing. The other thing that was disappointing was we didn't know anything about who the Grand Master was and we wanted to find out information about this position filled by multiple men but there was zero information on this.

One of the houses on a street in Old Town. This must have been in the Muslim Quarter with the second floor Mashrabiya.

Beautiful slate walkway to a gate.

Outside the gate continuing to the main wall of defense.

Panoramic view of inner Castle Walls.

Moat area between walls.

Pretty gate with marble emblems.

Pretty house on the way home just outside the walls.

This was my dream fixer upper just outside the walls and all of the tourism.

A repeat photo because it is soooo stunning.

Google nor the 3 of us could identify this thing hanging on a wall in the inner Old Town.

Many of the floors were original mosaics from 400 AD and those were good to see. But we wish that we learned more about the Grand Master. We made our way down the Street of the Knights to the Palace Church. It had collapsed in an earthquake and when they restored it they added another aisle. It was very pretty and some original murals were underneath the arches that remained. It was also free.

3 Mashrabiyas in a row.

Castle from a distance.

Inside the church you can see the ancient original murals inside the arches.

The Church was free on Sundays.

What is left of a ancient mural.

Outside of the Church.

Exploring the yard of the Church.

We made our way to the Archaeological Museum of Rhodes which was very good and it had many levels that was frankly quite overwhelming. There was so many doors to enter with more to see.

The outside courtyard of the Archaeological Museum.

This was my favorite museum piece. It would look lovely in my back yard.

Once a hospital built by the Knights of St. John.

The ever present Greek and Knights of St. John emblems.

Mosaic Floors are built to last millenniums.

This was a very pretty statue taken somewhere from Greece.

A display of marble pieces.

Arabic or Ottoman Turk marble slabs, which are highly decorative.

Another pretty street.

Feeding of the cats. There are dishes
of cat food and water on every block
to feed the stray cats.

I ate many Persimmons in Greece. They are highly nutritious and about the size of a large tomato. You eat the whole fruit. I ate them in the morning with my Greek Yogurt. Greek Yogurt is unreal and creamy and thick unlike the tasteless Greek Yogurt at home.

The Museum building was built by the Knights of the order of St John as a hospital for the Knights and people on pilgrimage to the Holy Land. The hospital was built in 1400s. There were different levels of terraced gardens and fountains and it was a pretty posh hospital. Some of the rooms were large and cavernous and filled with marble museum pieces that were broken off from somewhere. It was a very interesting Museum to see and it was free.

We left the Museum and walked around and went through and found more of the gates into the walled City. This walled City is premier. It has the original moat area but the water in the moat is gone and in its place is a walking path around the walled city where people walk their dogs etc.

The Castle walls are extremely high and there was also an inner wall for added defense. It would have been a very hard Castle to take over but the Ottoman Turks managed to take it from the Knights and stayed in power until the early 1900s. They ceded it back to the Greeks and the Muslim people that lived there were rehoused back in Turkey. Muslims that decided to stay had already acclimatized and decided to become Greek.

We had walked around a lot. We had a good day. We had seen a lot. We had done a lot and our legs were really tired. For some reason it may be because we had done so much walking on cobblestone streets and these cobblestone streets are not flat, especially the Street of the Knights. They're rounded flat rocks that are placed on their ends and they are Mosaic-ed together and this is what the road was built of. You can see where the original carriage ruts are and with these tracks it is tricky to walk on. Our legs were done and we walked home. We have had really good weather and we decided to share a bottle of wine out on our balcony and just relax with our legs up. Lisa had hurt her ankle previously so she iced it as well.

We needed some more groceries and we decided to drive to a Lidl, which is equivalent of a Greek Walmart. Lidl is a chain of Greek grocery stores. We made our way there and quickly realized it was Sunday and Greeks spend time with family on Sunday. Saskatchewan use to have stores closed on Sundays and it was better for our society. We went back to our little corner store grocery store and collected enough groceries for Darren to put together a chicken and noodle mushroom casserole for us. We ate it, expecting again to go to bed and then he found another movie which was a Guy Richie movie about King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table and it seemed fitting because we were living in an original Knight established City. It turned out to be a good movie.

The next day we drove down the West Coast about halfway down the island of Rhodes and went to ancient Kamiros which also had a Temple of Athena, Apollo and other Temples. It's nicknamed the Greek Pompeii. It was €10 to get in and the only complaint would be that it did not have enough descriptors of what we were actually looking at it. But it had three major posters that gave us information and we eventually did find all the Temples and the Hellenistic House and the two Bath Houses, Sanctuary of the gods, etc. It would have been considered a fairly large town back then and they have probably excavated 50% of it.

You can see the Mediterranean Sea in the distance.

Huge blocks of ruins.

Huge granite pillars.

Large pillar that is still
standing.

Engraving is still visible.

Temple that is partially still standing.

Bath house.

This town of Kamiros would have had
great views of the Sea.

A large bush of Rosemary behind us.

Most likely this was where the community of Kamiros farmed in this verdant valley where Olive trees grow now.

Pretty views behind the town.

Aphrodite's Temple stood here.

A good view of ancient Kamiros.

Walking down where the main road was located you can almost smell the bread being baked in the bakeries and hear the children playing on the street.

We got back in the car and made our way to Embonas, another half hour inland and we saw scenic views in the interior of the island and it's quite pretty with gorges, olive trees and orchards, coniferous trees and vineyards.

Many goats are common to see in rural areas. Darren called these guys over but I reminded him that he was going to get them run over since we were on the highway.

The goats were staring at Darren wondering what he was?

This was a massive studly male goat.

Our main purpose for going to Embonas was to do wine tastings and see vineyards. We were there in November which is considered the winter season and most wine cellars close down and do their winter work. Harvesting was completed already. We learned this at Ebonas Wine Cellar from the lady that was pouring our wine. She taught us that their Sun-Dried Grape Wine is just like our Canadian Ice Wine. It was sweet but very flavorful. To be honest, I liked it much better than our Ice Wine. She served it cold and it was not nauseatingly sweet like some ice wines can be, but it actually tasted like a good Port. She gave us seven or eight different wine tastings, all white and all dry. They were all very flavorful and we picked one bottle each and bought them which were 12 and 13.50 Euro. The tasting was free and we weren't expecting that. We were expecting to pay 10 to 15 Euro per person for a tasting. I think we surprised her by buying wine, she was a little snappy at first and then she warmed up to us. She found out we were retired educators and then she gave us extra wines to try. The experience ended up to be quite a lot of fun and we then made our way home.

At Ebonas Wines, we were trying the Whites.

Our last day in Rhodes was a rainy morning and I had my laundry out on the line so I had to get that in very quickly and it later turned out to be a nice day at about 1:30 pm. We set out for the Archangel of Michael Cave which is on the Mediterranean side of Rhodes. It was a 31 minute walk from our rental. This was a very serene place to sit and pray. Someone looks after the place and decorated the cave with Icons etc. Outside of the Cave were numerous potted plants and cats and places to sit and stare out to Sea. It was a cute quirky little place that Lisa had discovered on Google Maps.

This was an old abandoned windmill in the City of Rhodes.

This was the interior.

Squirting Cucumber plant which grows along the ground. It is toxic and can cause some damage to an animal or human when it explodes when ripe.

The walk along the Sea wall

It was a pretty walk.

The stairs up to the Arch Angel Cave.

Lisa in the Cave.

Some of the potted plants around the cave. It was nice to sit and just watch the Sea.

The views were quite stunning.

The ever-present Cat in Greece. This is the very common Tortoise Shell Cat. Most cats are friendly and want your food and your love.

This rock overhang was so cool.

More cats.

The Seafront was very pretty with cement boardwalks. We could see Turkey it was very close. We wondered why we did not go and visit??? We continued walking along the North Seafront and continued into the Old Town. Lisa wanted to do a little more shopping and we we wanted to eat at a Restaurant for our last Gyros Pita in Rhodes Greece.